


All the Lovely Ones Have Scars

by olivemartini



Series: All The Lovely Ones Have Scars [3]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Pre-Relationship, before Iron Man, first day of work
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-26
Updated: 2018-03-26
Packaged: 2019-04-08 06:29:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14099301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/olivemartini/pseuds/olivemartini
Summary: Her first day of working for Mr. Stark, she's expecting it to only last a week, because that's what Mr. Stane had told her."Don't take it personally,"  He had said, sighing like he, at least, was trying to make things work.  "He fires everybody."And that may be true, but Pepper needed this job, and she needed her reputation to stay intact, so she was going to make this job stick, whether this Tony Stark wanted her to stay or not.At the very least, she was going to last longer than a week.





	All the Lovely Ones Have Scars

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [可愛之人必有可恨之處](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14526936) by [HigyoChisato](https://archiveofourown.org/users/HigyoChisato/pseuds/HigyoChisato)



When she went to work that first day, Pepper was honestly expecting only to last a week.

Not because she thought the job was going to be too hard, or because she thought she wasn't going to be good at it.  She thought she was going to only last a week because she got told so during her interview.

"He's probably going to fire you."  Mr. Stane had said, heaving out a self pitying sigh and making a series of aggravated pen marks across the paper that she's pretty sure were only for dramatic effect.  "We've been going week to week for a while.  Just didn't want you to plan to be in for the long haul."

Still, she still half expected that to be all talk.  Pepper hadn't met Tony yet, and she hadn't paid attention to the tabloid reports that her google searches have turned up, because come on, he can't be that bad.  He's a business man, and he runs a multi billion dollar company, and keeps about one hundred charities up and running.  There had to have been a reason that those other assistants were fired.

Except there wasn't.  She found that out during her first five minutes, when she walked down those freaky glass steps in the brand new high heels she had bought just for the job (and she really shouldn't have bothered, her feet already hurt), balancing a file of papers in one arm and a cup of coffee in the other as she pushed through the workshop door like the bodiless voice had told her to.

(She had gotten warned about that.  It's name was Jarvis.  She was also told that Tony would like her better if she had coffee to give him, like some sort of classical conditioning.)

"Hello?"  She liked knocking, not shouting, but there was no way he was going to hear her over the rock music blasting through the speakers.  "Mr. Stark?"

"Hey!  You're..."  He had wheeled out from underneath the car while she was walking, and Pepper just barely kept herself from screaming.  Her first impression of him is that he had a very pretty smile, and her second that she was  _absolutely not_ going to shake his hand even if it got her fired, because he was covered in grease, but he didn't offer, just wiggled a wrench in her direction.  "The new girl."

"Ms. Potts."  She would have felt better to have shaken his hand, actually, because then she would have something to with her hands other than just stand here.  "It's nice to meet you, Mr. Stark.  I've heard so much about you."

That's a lie.  She hadn't really followed Tony Stark himself until last night, when she stayed up until one A.M. digging up all the dirt and news stories she could.  Her old jobs had required her to know his work and his inventions, but this one was purely about Tony the person.  And so far, that person was looking like challenge.

"No doubt."  Tony's smile seemed to have stretched tighter across his face.  It was less crinkled at the eyes, now, harsher at the mouth.  "Listen, I have to warn you, I'm probably going to fire you.  Don't take it personally.  I'll give you a great severance package when you leave, and if you need it, I'll write a glowing letter of recommendation of how I realized I no longer needed your services through no fault of your own.  Unless of course you suck.  Are you planning to suck?"

Pepper found herself shaking her head no.  She was a bit shocked into silence, because everything -him, this house, the garage, this conversation- was dripping with wealth, screaming of someone who had never known what it meant to have to wade through hardship to get what he wanted.  He didn't understand how important it was for her to keep this job, how badly she needed this fresh start.

She was going to keep this job, Tony be damned.

"Is that coffee?"  He made grabby hands at it.  When he made no move to actually take it from her, she set it down on the counter.  "I like you already."

At the very least, she was going to last more than a week.

 

 

 

The next morning, she's more prepared for the blunt way that Tony speaks, and the number of lewd jokes he made without ever seeming to notice he was making him, and the way that he really was insisting to get her name wrong, even though she knew from an overheard phone call with Obadiah that he knew it was Pepper Potts. 

She told herself that she just needed time adjusting, but that was until she got to the meeting that Tony was supposed to be leading and found that he wasn't there.  

"Where is he?"  Mr. Stane was angry, and Pepper herself was very tense, but they were still both careful to keep the smiles on.  "Why are you here and he's not?"

"I told him what time it is!"

"And you came without him?"  Mr. Stane was calling Tony, but since he had called him thirty-three times already, it was a pretty halfhearted attempt.  "He might not fire you, but I will, Ms. Potts, make no mistake."

"I'm not being paid to be a babysitter."

Her voice might have gotten too loud, or Mr. Stane very tense, or maybe he was just one of those men who didn't like being snapped at by a woman.  God knows she had met enough of them in her lifetime.  

"Yes, Ms. Potts, that is exactly what you are being paid to do."  He stuffed his phone back in his pocket.  "People are going to lose their jobs over this."

"That's not fair."  She couldn't get over the injustice of some corporations, how the men on top make a mistake and the little people pay for it.  She didn't think that Stark Industries was like that.  "Just because he made a mistake-,"

"They have the jobs because of this deal.  This deal existed only because Tony was going to sell it to them.  And both those things went up in smoke, so what do you suggest that I do?"

"Let me give the presentation."  She doesn't know what to possess her to say it, because she always was fairly bad at public speaking, but she had gotten it into her head that this was her mess, her mistake, and it was her that would need to fix it so those nice people wouldn't lose their jobs.  "I went over it with him yesterday, I know it."  When he didn't give the files to her, she took them.  "A poor presentation is better than no presentation."

"Do you even know what you were reading about yesterday?"

Pepper paused to kick her heels off under the table, because there was no way she was going up there with those things on, and glared at him.  "Did anyone even actually read my resume?"  More and more, she was getting the feeling that Tony had just flipped through a book up pictures and chose the one he liked.  "Just let me try.  If it doesn't work, you have my full permission to fire me."

 

 

 

It works, mostly because men in suits are more receptive to a women who stumbles over her words and smiles while she apologizes than a man who thinks he is so high above them he doesn't even show up.  The deal remains, the people keep their jobs, and Mr. Stane offers to give her the rest of the day off, as well as gives her a look that she took to mean that might be on more equal footing.

Pepper could have gone home, but she didn't, because she had jobs to do, and she had an entitled prick to yell at, but then she got to the tower and was informed by Jarvis that Tony had told him not to let her up, because he was having lots of sex with multiple hot models at the same time and he didn't want to scar her innocent eyes.

Pepper wasn't sure if it was a joke or not.

 

 

 

"You have to get up."

"I don't."

"You do.  You have work.  You have things to invent.  You've got calls to make."  Pepper couldn't believe that this was happening.  She was standing in her bosses bedroom, yanking back the blankets and attempting to get him out of bed with the promise of coffee.  "Responsibilities, Mr. Stark."

She'd been an assistant before.  Not for a while, but she had been one, and she knew that sometimes you had to make undignified tasks that you thought were beneath you.  Get the dry cleaning.  Watch the kids.  Pick out a birthday present for the wife or secret girlfriend (sometimes at the same time), get a second cup of coffee because the second wasn't good enough, go flirt with the businessmen so they don't notice the boss is late.  That sort of stuff.

She'd never been sent by her boss' legal guardian to wake him up from bed.

"No, Pep."  He pops the "p," and that annoys her more than anything else he could have done, because it lets her smell the alcohol that was still clinging to him.  "You have responsibilities.  Calls to make.  Emails to send pretending to be me.  Excuses to give." 

"Mr. Stark-,"

"Jarvis!"  He rolled over and threw his arm across his face, blocking the sun from his eyes.  "Get her out of here."

"Ms. Potts." The AI (Tony had given her the run down on the lingo a few minutes ago, before she started to try and get him out of bed) sounded apologetic, polite, and ever the voice of reason to Tony's madness.  "I'm going to have to ask you to leave, or the police will be called."

Pepper stared up at the AI, and then down at Tony. She smacked him over the head with a pillow, and then left, slamming the door behind her.

She's a sucky babysitter.

 

 

 

The fourth day, she finds him passed out on the kitchen floor.

Obadiah is already sighing by the time he picks up her phone, and tells her just to leave him.  That it isn't her fault, just not to bother with waking him.

But she doesn't.  She watches him for a moment instead, and then rummages through the cabinets until she finds a bottle of Tylenol, then set about making him breakfast, which she wraps and leaves in the fridge for him to find later, when whatever he drank finally wears off.

She leaves a note on the counter telling him to call her when he wakes up.  He never does call, but she takes the quiet smile the next morning as a thank you.

 

 

 

After that, Pepper thinks they were getting somewhere, but they weren't.  It was just Tony being his entitled self, treating people how his mood demanded it, and yesterday he had been inclined to be pleasant because it was less painful with his hangover.

Today, he was being spiteful just because, and he's got three people here that she had never seen before and he wasn't bothering to introduce.  She wouldn't normally be here while he had guests, but she had to get this signature to the office in an hour or something very bad would happen.  Obadiah hadn't told her what, but she was sure it involved stocks dipping and people being fired.  

It always does.

"Please, Mr. Stark, just a moment of your time."  She was running through the house after him, heels clicking on the tile, wishing that those people weren't here, because it was sort of turning him into an asshole.  And she was almost through the week, she was, and she got a day off on Sunday, so if he would sign the paper then everything was going to be okay.  "I just need one-,"

The door gets slammed in her face, but it isn't locked, which meant that Tony had done it more to be a nuisance that to actually keep her out.  She wrenches it open, then stalks up to them, shoving her way into the middle of the group, never mind that this isn't the way a proper assistant is supposed to act.

 _Think of the severance package,_ a part of her is saying, but the other part is screaming at her to do her job, damn it.  That part wins, so she shoves the clipboard in front of him.  And he had to do was take it.

But he wouldn't.  She knew that even as she did it, but she still didn't expect him to laugh and grab her around the waist, pin her to his side.  And even though it wasn't really anything bad, more of a friendly gesture, she rips herself away.  It was one thing for him to do that while they were at a chance meeting in a resteraunt, but it was quite another for him to do it in this setting, like she was a plaything for him to use.

Pepper's sure that he didn't mean it that way, but he still did it, and she doesn't like it when people treat her like she's something they can order around.  She's tired, too, tired of this stupid job and these heels that pinch and the way that Tony keeps pretending like he doesn't remember her request to call her by her last name, please, and hates that he's making them both act like twelve year olds.  And she hates that the lives of hundreds of people will depend on her getting this signature, which he doesn't seem to be intent on giving.

"You will sign this paper."  She slammed the file down on the table, and it made Tony fall quiet.  For once, he did not have anything to say.  "You say that you're the boss and that means you can do what you want, but really all that means is that every action you take effects people you'll never even meet."  He opens his mouth to talk, but Pepper talked over him, because she had a job to do and this seemed to be the only way to do it.  "You will sign this paper, because if you do not, there will be a hundred people losing their jobs because their contract has timed out.  Do you want that on your conscious, Mr. Stark?  Because I don't.  And don't presume to touch me like that ever again."

She was breathing hard.  She was also getting the signature, which was good, but in all likelihood she was so fired, which was bad.

He scrawls his name on the line, and then hands it back to her.  "Anything else, Ms. Potts?"

He remembered her name.  That was something, but not enough.  "Not a thing, Mr. Stark."

 

 

She gets the file to Obadiah an hour before the deadline.

"I think I'm out of a job,"  she says, and doesn't really feel anything about it.  Pepper had expected to be relieved, but she isn't, just a little sad.  She really didn't like to lose.

"Probably."  He rapped his knuckles on the glass and nodded towards the roomful of people typing on computers.  "But they aren't, and that's what matters, right?"

 _The severance package is waiting, too,_ she reminds herself, but her stomach was still twisting, like she really didn't want to leave.

 

 

She's not fired yet, though, so she walks down to the garage in her too tight heels, holding her customary folder and cup of scalding hot coffee.

"Mr. Stark?"  It's sort of like the first day, only now the workshop is quiet, and he was sitting at his desk in a dress shirt and beaten up jeans.  "Jarvis said I would find you down here."

He stared at her for a moment, and she braced herself for being told that she would not need to report for work tomorrow.  "I think I owe you an apology."

Pepper stared.

"I was rude.  I was unprofessional.  I took liberties, and I crossed lines without taking a moment to think that you were just trying to get through a day of work.  I forget, like you said, that my actions effect other people in ways that I don't intend.  I should have known better, Ms. Potts, and I'll hope you'll forgive me."

He seems to be waiting for her to say something.  Pepper just took a few steps forward and laid the coffee down in the normal spot, eyeing him warily.  "If you'll forgive me for my outburst the other day, Mr. Stark."

Tony smiled, like he knew that she was only doing that because she had to.  The employee remains polite even when the boss is an ass.  Its one of the fundamental rules of life. 

"If you want to leave, I understand.  You'll get that recommendation."

"And the severance package?"

This time, he must have recognized the joke, because his smile does not tighten at the corners.  It's a real smile, she thinks.

"That, too."  He takes a step forward and holds his hand out.  She wouldn't know then what a monumental gesture that was, but she would learn one day, and realize what an effort it took him.  "But if you want to, I'd be happy to have you remain as my personal assistant."

Pepper shook his hand, debating, and then rounded the desk to lay the papers across the table, laying a pen beside it, just the way she knew he liked to have it set up.

"We've got some papers to sign Mr. Stark."  She said, and when he smiles at her over the top of the coffee cup, she knows she's the one who gets to stay.

**Author's Note:**

> come find me on Instagram @olive.writes.fanfic


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